


Hazel Tries A Chicken Nugget

by clairewolf



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Camp Half-Blood, Hazel doesn't get the future, Other, i love hazel levesque, i wrote this a while ago and made an ao3 account specifically so i could post this, im tagging this with solangelo even though its only implied just to be a dick, overglorification of chicken nuggets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 11:46:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16325606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clairewolf/pseuds/clairewolf
Summary: Exactly what it says on the tin.





	Hazel Tries A Chicken Nugget

**Author's Note:**

> I literally made an AO3 account so the world would be deprived of this literary masterpiece no longer. Enjoy.

It was already completely dark outside at Camp Half-Blood- around eight o'clock at night. Dinner had ended over an hour ago and all of the campers had gathered around the campfire to roast marshmallows, sing songs, and make s'mores. 

Well, almost everyone.

"Is it really that big of a deal?" 

Leo seemed almost offended by Hazel's comment. "Look Hazel, we just want to help you."

Hazel crossed her arms. She'd been waiting here for at least two hours by now. Or perhaps only ten minutes. Her ADHD combined with the lack of clocks in the Big House made it difficult for her to tell how much time had actually passed. 

She would be with the other campers at the bonfire by now, if only she'd kept her mouth shut at dinner...  
________________________________________

Earlier, at dinner...

Leo shoved himself in between Hazel and Nico at the Hades table, groaning loudly and dramatically as he did so. When he was ignored by the two siblings, he only continued to groan louder, slumping down in his seat. 

"You're not supposed to be sitting here," Hazel reminded Leo.

It was true. Despite the recent merging with Camp Jupiter, Chiron had made it abundantly clear that he wanted to continue the tradition of campers sitting at tables according to their godly parent during meals. (Although, Nico had informed her that whenever she wasn't visiting, he could usually get away with sitting at the Apollo table. She wasn't sure as to why, and Nico didn't appear to be keen on elaborating.)

Leo either ignored what Hazel had just told him or hadn't heard her. Hazel decided it must be the latter, despite knowing Leo to lack the manners she'd been raised with.

"Don't get me wrong, barbecue is great, but I have a serious nugget craving right now," Leo complained loudly, poking at the food on Hazel's plate with her fork.

Hazel frowned. "If you think I'm going to summon you gold nuggets, then think again."

Leo snorted as if she'd told a joke, though Hazel was pretty sure that she'd said nothing indicative of one.

"While I'd never pass up a chance to get gold," Leo said, grinning impishly and nudging Hazel's arm, "I meant like... chicken nuggets."

"Chicken nuggets?" Hazel asked in a hushed tone, more to herself than to Leo. She felt as if she had heard the name before, but wasn't sure if she knew what they were.

Wait a minute...

Hazel's eyes lit up once the memory reconnected with her. "Hey, you never finished telling me about those!"

Leo glanced at her, looking lost. "Huh?"

"Back on the Argo II," Hazel explained. "You mentioned those... those chicken nuggets...but I didn't know what they were. You never did explain them to me."

Leo's eyes widened. "Wait a minute, I never told you?"

Hazel shook her head. Leo's astonished expression quickly changed to horror as the realization dawned upon him.

Leo stood up, grabbing Hazel's arm and hauling her out of her seat, and dragging her away from the table. "Holy Hephaestus, this is an emergency!"  
________________________________________

And with that, Hazel was now trapped in the Big House with none other than Percy Jackson and Leo Valdez. And was going to miss out on all of the campfire fun. All because she just had to know what a chicken nugget was.

"I don't get why you two can't just explain what a chicken nugget is."

Percy winced as if her words physically hurt him to hear. "Hazel, you can't just explain a chicken nugget. It's not the same. You have to experience it."

"One's first chicken nugget is an experience that cannot be forgotten," Leo added wistfully.

Percy snorted, leaning back in his chair. "Dude, it's not that deep. I mean like, they're good, but...it's only like, fast food good."

"Fast food good?" Hazel felt like her head was spinning. She was pretty sure there was nothing correct about the words fast and food and good being put together that way.

"You know like...sure, it's alright, but you're still eating trash," Percy summed up, looking unsure of his own explanation.

Leo looked appalled. "Chicken nuggets are not trash!"

Percy seemed as if he was still willing to argue, but before he could, the door opened and Nico walked in with a large, brown paper bag.

"Mission accomplished," Nico announced, waving the bag in the air.

"Thank the gods," Leo sighed. "What kind did you get?"

Nico frowned. "Uh, McDonald's. Where else?"

Leo gagged, taking the bag from Nico's hands and peering inside. "Seriously? You have the ability to shadow travel wherever you want and you get your nuggets from McDonald's?"

"I thought only McDonald's makes these," Nico muttered, staring at the bag in Leo's hands with a new sort of distrust.

Percy buried his face in his hands. "Oh my gods."

"You couldn't bother to get the dinosaur ones? Arguably the best nuggets of all?" Leo complained, holding the takeaway bag in front of him as if it was full of toxic waste. From the way Leo was reacting, it probably could've been.

Nico looked confused. "No, you said chicken nuggets. I didn't even know there were nuggets made of dinosaurs."

"Is he joking?" Leo asked no one in particular as Percy cracked up. "Please tell me he's joking."

"I'll try it."

The room fell silent at the unexpected words that unmistakably came from Hazel.

"Hazel-" Leo started, but Hazel interrupted before he could finish.

"I'm tired of not knowing," Hazel continued, "things that everyone else knows. If I'm going to have a second chance at life, then I'm going to be a part of this future! Even if it means eating chicken nuggets from a...this... McDonald's that y'all look down on. So...give me the bag!"

"It's not that deep," Percy muttered as Leo set the bag down on the table in front of Hazel. 

Hazel stuck her hand in the grease-stained bag, and pulled out what she supposed was a chicken nugget. A small, misshapen brown nugget. 

"Well, these nuggets sure aren't made from gold," Hazel said, slightly disappointed in the lacking appearance of the nugget. No, the nugget of the future.

And slowly, with all three of the boys watching her, she put it in her mouth and chewed.

And that moment was a moment unlike anything in either of Hazel's lives. 

"This is...this is amazing!" she cried, once she had swallowed it. "I want to have some more of these!"  
_______________________________________

Three Weeks Later...

"Annabeth, I am begging you to change the channel. Hazel deserves better than Full House."

Annabeth gripped the remote so tightly that her knuckles turned white. "She needs to learn about all of the important culture she's missed out on. We're watching Full House."

Piper rolled her eyes from where she was laying upside down on the couch next to Hazel. "Full House, more like Dull House. We should watch Friends!"

Hazel looked back and forth between the two arguing girls, unsure whether or not it was safe to comment. A few days ago, they had both decided to make it their mission to completely update Hazel's knowledge of modern entertainment when she hadn't understood a reference Piper had made.

Every night, the three girls had been sneaking into the Big House and using the television set (more modern-looking than any that Hazel had seen in her previous life) to watch the programs that she had missed out on.

The problem was, Hazel didn't necessarily like any of them, other than last night's Fresh Prince of Bel Air. The theme song was still in her head.

"Hazel can't watch Friends!" Annabeth hissed. "The jokes are too...y'know..." she said, gesturing with her hands.

Piper crossed her arms. "I refuse to watch anything with Bob Saget in it."

"Who?" Hazel asked, popping a chicken nugget into her mouth.

"Him," Piper spat, jabbing a finger at the father on the television screen who appeared to be comforting his daughter. "I met him once on a business trip with my dad. He spilled his drink on my shirt and didn't even apologize!"

Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Okay, but- hey, wait, Hazel... what are you eating?"

Piper stopped arguing as well to look at Hazel, who was about to put another chicken nugget in her mouth. "What- oh my gods."

"What is it?" Hazel asked. Her mouth was full as she said it, so it came out as more of a "Whm ith'n?"

"Weren't you eating those at lunch, too?" Annabeth asked, looking concerned.

Hazel nodded, swallowing. "A few weeks ago I tried these for the first time. I've been eating some every day ever since!They're really good."

Piper fell off the couch, her expression both horrified and outraged at the same time. "I am going to kill Nico."

"What? Why?" Hazel was confused. What could ever be wrong with a delicacy this delicious?

"Those are extremely unhealthy, especially if you're eating them every day," Annabeth said, looking disgusted.

Piper grimaced. "Hazel, do you even know what those are MADE of? How they're made?"

Hazel shook her head helplessly, clutching the paper bag.

Annabeth sighed. "Well, now I know what we're watching. We're gonna need someone else, though."  
_______________________________________

When Annabeth returned with the half-asleep Nico and Leo, Piper announced the name of the movie they were watching: Super Size Me.

Nico rubbed his eyes. "Will told me that this movie's medically innacurate and was only produced for shock value."

Hazel decided she'd ask who Will was later, and how he would know the medical accuracy of a movie.

"And from an extremely biased source," Leo added with a yawn. "No offense, Pipes, but I don't trust what vegans have to say about chicken nuggets."

Piper scowled. "I guess we could watch one of the other million documentaries that tell you how the chicken nuggets at McDonald's are made instead. We'll just have to find them."  
________________________________________

By the middle of the documentary that Annabeth had picked out, Hazel felt ready to throw up as the man on the screen explained the process of chicken nugget making- a process which involved a pink, pasty substance that looked inedible to Hazel at best and completely toxic at worst.

"Oh wow, that's gross," Leo said, making a face. 

"This is disgusting," Nico said, before taking another handful of Hazel's chicken nuggets and shoving them into his mouth absentmindedly.

"Please turn it off," Hazel said, holding her stomach. "I think I'm gonna be sick. I am never eating another chicken nugget again."


End file.
